Hitler - Benes - Tito

Prepared on the basis of international sources and literature, this monograph presents the history of political, economic, social, cultural, and military conflicts that began abruptly in the year 1848 and continue up until the present in their after-effects. The focus is, on the one hand, on ethnic-national contention between Germans and Czechs, of Magyars with Slovaks and Serbs, of Serbs and Croats with Germans, as well as between Slovenes and Germans, and, on the other hand, the national-state conflicts of the German Empire and Austria with Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. In hindsight, the co-existence of the nationalities in the Habsburg Monarchy until 1914 was relatively trouble-free and influenced by the modernization of constitution and administration, the school system, public transport, the economy, and the health system. The great `language-battles` constituted primarily altercations of German- and Hungarian-speaking educated elites with those of the emergent Slav nationalities, who were fighting not least over current and future posts in the public administration. The Ballhausplatz`s conscious decision for war in 1914 worsened both the attitudes of the Slav nationalities toward the Habsburg Monarchy and also of the nationalities toward one another. The Germans suspected the Czechs and South Slavs of treasonable activities; the Slav nationalities and their emigrants abroad (Masaryk, Beneš) began looking for support from the Entente. The unbelievably quick and relatively bloodless dissolution of Austria-Hungary made way for new `national states`, which in most cases were in fact `nationalities states` with many national minorities. The Czechs became the leading nationality in the new Czechoslovakia, while the Serbs acquired the same position in the new Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, and both groups tried dominating the administration, society, economy, and culture from their respective capitals in Prague and Belgrade. Of course the Germans in the Bohemian lands (the Sudeten Germans), Slovenia, and the Vojvodina soon offered economic, social, and cultural counter-elites, and the Hungarians did the same in Slovakia and the Vojvodina. With the Great Depression and Hitler`s accession to power, the German Empire`s economic and political influence quickly increased in east-central and south-eastern Europe and the Empire ideologically influenced the German minorities in the region more strongly in the Bohemian lands and Slovenia, less so in the Vojvodina. Hitler`s expansionist goals foresaw the destruction of Czechoslovakia and the integration of Yugoslavia into the Triple Alliance. The Munich Agreement therefore constituted an unwelcome delay, while the destruction of Yugoslavia only became a war aim at the end of March 1941. The six years of Nazi rule in Czechoslovakia (1939- 1945) and the four years of Nazi rule in Yugoslavia (1941-1945) with the accompanying military, police, administrative, economic, and social penetration and repression with the help of occupation authorities, Wehrmacht, Waffen-SS, Gestapo, and security services demonstrated varying techniques of governing: repression of intellectuals, integration of workers and peasants into the war economy, deportations, shootings of hostages, and genocide. Of all ethnic-confessional groups, the Jews and Roma suffered the highest losses, followed by the Serbs and Slovenes. Revenge and retaliation against the `Germans` followed closely in 1944/45, first in the Vojvodina, then in Slovenia, and finally in the Bohemian lands. AVNOJ resolutions and Beneš decrees provided for confiscations of property and withdrawal of the protection of the law. The `wild expulsions` that accompanied the advance of the Red Army preceded the forced expulsions from Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary that the Potsdam Conference sanctioned, while Tito`s regime carried out `ethnic cleansing` of ist own. Although the Federal Republic of Germany and the Republic of Austria embraced the displaced persons within only a few years, completely different memories of the war as well as the beginning of the Cold War delayed for years, if not decades, agreements with the communist governments in Prague and Belgrade respecting questions of property. The development of a new culture of memory has only become possible since the fall of the Iron Curtain and has recurrently lead to profound debates within all nations that were involved in the Second World War.